mcconnell $3.3M, hatch $2.9M, baucus $2.8M, grassley $2.7M,
lieberman $2.6M, burr $2.4M, ensign $2.4M, cornyn $2.2M, kyl $2.1M,
conrad $2.1M, cantor $1.8M boehner $1.7M, coburn $1.2M, j wilson 800K
were paid by the Medical Industrial Complex to kill Health Care Reform.

Citizens for Tax Justice pointed this out. The tax legislation enacted under President George W. Bush from 2001 through 2006 will cost $2.48 trillion over the 2001-2010 period. This includes the revenue loss of $2.11 trillion that results directly from the Bush tax cuts as well as the $379 billion in additional interest payments on the national debt that we must make since the tax cuts were deficit-financed. Over the upcoming decade (2010-2019), the costs of the health care proposals approved by three committees in the U.S. House of Representatives are projected to be around $1 trillion and deficit neutral(that means they’re paid for). In 2010, when all the Bush tax cuts are finally phased in, a staggering 52.5 percent of the benefits will go to the richest 5 percent of taxpayers. The Bush tax cuts were deficit-financed, which increased the national debt and resulted in greater interest payments on that debt. They never even tried to pay for their tax-cuts. So, for the price of bush’s tax-cuts for the wealthiest 5%, we could have had Health Care for every American. Instead Americans got bupkus and cheney/bush’s republican buddies got filthy rich off of the Blood Money from No-Bid, Cost-Plus Federal Contracts.

12 Million Americans were denied Health Care Coverage by the Medical Industrial Complex because they had a Pre-Existing Medical Condition. 12K Americans lose Insurance Coverage everyday. Over 18K Americans die each day because they lack health insurance. (Source: WaPo Article 05′ by Harvard Prof. E. Warren)

Follow the Money: Link

Call Congress and demand, Single-Payer Health Care for All!

Sign Single-Payer Petition: Link

Don’t let the Medical Industrial Complex steal your Health Care from you and your family by donating huge sums of money to Crooked Politicians in order to maintain the Status Quo. Keep up the good fight.

SEMPER FI!

But, I don’t see any real plan to deal with that. If the cost of services continue to skyrocket, the cost of ANY insurance plan, public or no, is going to continue going up.

Insurance reform is fine, but we ought to be talking about the cost of the services themselves much more than has been discussed.

And, to me, just planning on waste and fraud or maybe jawboning some fees down isn’t going to cut it. There is some other pressure point pushing all these costs up. More expensive machines? Lawyers? Doctors?

I may not agree with the entire reform program, but I do think making preventative care and later in life check ups easily available is an important thing.

Someone mentioned premiums going up. Yes, they can’t help but go up because the new insurance conditions begin right away, but, assuming a public option passes, there is no public option insurance until 2013. With all the pre-existing conditions having to be accepted, the co-pays eliminated, and all the other additional costs–and no public option around to move costs down–where else are the premiums going to go but up?

This is why, in a certain way, the HR 3200 needs to be scrapped and some thing that is more well thought out needs to be done. Though, today I heard Kent Conrad or Claire McCaskill say that HR 3200 is totally dead.

So, at this point, there really is no specific plan to even discuss one way or the other.

He did say once some months ago that his administration will communicate in public what it says in private in regard to foreign policy. I hope that’s his standard for domestic policy as well.

- Tom

For older folks get them into work based programs…reward workers who do so (less medical costs in the long run). Obesity leads to diabetes, orthopedic problems, circulatory and heart disease and a whole host of other problems. Smoking…unprotected sex (yes for adults…who are also teh stupid, or need to be constantly reminded…or giving the “tools”).

To use the Public College analogy…it would be like offering a special college education to those who never graduated from HS or got a GED. That would not impact private universities whatsoever.

I also have an odd point to make…just what was the “John McCain Plan” for the unemployed that Obama referred to. I know about McCains desire to privatize all insurance covered by business and then offer tax credits as recompense by the individual if they bought insurance. But how does this work for the unemployed? Tax credits? For people not likely to have significant income? To people who might not have enough to afford the initial premium for health insurance?